Introduction by The Editor:
When embarrassing information must be released by the federal government, the best time to publish it is on a Friday evening, after most of the Washington reporters are at home for the weekend.  That way, if the bad news is spread at all, it will be done by the weekend B-team, with little or no critical review.  This technique was first brought to my attention by Rush Limbaugh in about 1995.  There is only one reason for this behavior, and that is deception.

Senate reauthorizes warrantless spy powers just after midnight deadline.  The Senate passed a controversial extension of the federal government's warrantless spying powers just after a midnight deadline on Friday over objections from Democrats and Republicans who opposed the incidental collection of US citizens' data as part of the authority.  In a 60-34 vote, Democrats and Republicans voted to reauthorize Title VII of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) until 2026, sending the legislation to President Biden's desk for a signature.  The White House issued a statement in strong support of the legislation, called the Reforming Intelligence and Securing America Act, before it passed the House last week in a 273-147 bipartisan vote.  The FISA authority was set to expire on April 19, which proponents had warned would end critical intelligence-gathering efforts through a provision known as Section 702.

Biden Admin Has Flown Over 400,000 Migrants To Airports Across US.  The U.S. has flown in over 400,000 migrants from a host of countries since President Joe Biden took office, according to Customs and Border Protection (CBP).  Under the Biden administration's CHNV program, some nationals hailing from Cuba, Haiti, Nicaragua and Venezuela can be eligible to come to the United States "in a safe and orderly way" and obtain humanitarian parole status, meaning they are here legally and can obtain work authorization.  Over 400,000 migrants hailing from these nations have been flown into airports across the U.S. as of March, CBP said in a statement on Friday [4/12/2024].

Lights Out:  Biden Admin Targets Lightbulbs In Latest Appliance Crackdown.  The Biden administration finalized energy efficiency regulations targeting light bulbs on Friday [4/12/2024].  The Department of Energy (DOE) announced the final rules for "general services lamps," a category of products that includes light bulbs, to nudge the market to adopt more energy efficient models.  The Biden administration, led chiefly by the DOE, has pushed similar regulations targeting a host of household appliances.

The Editor says...
[#1] If new light bulb technology (or any other innovation in household appliances) will save the consumers money, no coercion by the government is necessary.  [#2] Light bulbs do not emit carbon dioxide.  The power plants that emit carbon dioxide are gonna run, whether your light bulbs are turned on or off.  [#3] Carbon dioxide is plant food, not pollution.  There is no reason to avoid carbon dioxide emissions.

FBI Quietly Releases Unclassified File on Ashli Babbitt, During the Solar Eclipse.  While most Americans were dialed in on the solar eclipse, the FBI quietly released unclassified documents regarding Ashli Babbitt, the Air Force veteran whom a Capitol Police officer killed on January 6th.  On April 8th, the FBI released a highly redacted 69-page file on details of Ashli Babbitt's death, military background, and testimonies on Babbitt's character.  On page three of the file, it was written, "BABBITT is deceased, and therefore, this case is not being nominated to TSDB."  TSDB stands for "the terrorist screening data.["]

Biden's Next EV Mandate Is Out and It's Going to Break America.  Say goodbye to the trucking industry as we know it, and goodbye to the American economy, too.  You might have missed it on Good Friday — which you can be sure was no accident — when the Biden EPA released its new tailpipe rules for semi-trucks, but the new rules will destroy how we move goods around the country.  It seems like only two weeks ago that I told you about Presidentish Biden's new EPA regulations, coming into effect starting in 2027, that will force two-thirds of new car buyers into electric vehicles whether they want one or not.  The tailpipe rules will effectively outlaw most gas and diesel engines by requiring a near-impossible 52% reduction in emissions.  On the Good Friday News Dump, the EPA announced similar restrictions on semi-trucks, again starting in just three years, and the changes will require one of those "fundamental transformations" the Left is so fond of.

House passes $1.2 trillion spending package hours before shutdown deadline, sending it to Senate.  The House passed a massive spending package on Friday to fully fund the government through September, sending it to the Senate ahead of a midnight deadline to avert a partial shutdown.  The House approved the $1.2 trillion package, which was unveiled early Thursday, in a vote of 286 to 134.  The package wraps six spending bills into one to fund about three-quarters of the government until the end of the fiscal year.  Another package funding the rest of the government cleared Congress two weeks ago.  A majority of Republicans voted against the measure, with House conservatives objecting to the funding levels in the agreement that House Speaker Mike Johnson reached with Democratic leadership in the Senate.

Congress passes first package of spending bills just hours before shutdown deadline for key agencies.  The Senate on Friday approved a $460 billion package of spending bills in time to meet a midnight deadline for avoiding a shutdown of many key federal agencies, a vote that gets lawmakers about halfway home in wrapping up their appropriations work for the 2024 budget year.  The measure contains six annual spending bills and has already passed the House.  It now goes to President Joe Biden to be signed into law.  The White House said he would do so Saturday, and "agencies will not shut down and may continue their normal operations."

A Tale of Two Presidents.  President-In-Name-Only Joe Biden finally decided to visit East Palestine, Ohio — the community that last year endured both a toxic train derailment and the government's questionable decision to burn the spilled hazardous chemicals and poison the region's air.  Given Biden's obvious cognitive decline, it's impossible to know whether PINO mistakenly thought he was heading out to provide aid and comfort to Palestinian terrorists in their war against Israel or whether he wanted to belatedly feign love for blue-collar Americans before demanding their votes in November.  Either way, Dementia Joe made the trip late in the day on a Friday so that coverage of his visit would disappear with the rest of the administration's conveniently flushed news.

300,000 Illegal Border Crossings In December.  Trying to hide just how bad the crisis at the border has become, the Biden administration released the December border numbers in a Friday night news dump.  This was the latest the numbers have been released in at least eight years.  Customs and Border Protection (CBP) data shows 302,034 illegal immigrants were encountered attempting to cross the U.S.-Mexico border in December, the highest month ever recorded in DHS history.  For 34 straight months, monthly encounters have been higher than even the highest month seen under the previous administration.  Biden's border crisis is so bad, this is now the fifth time CBP has needed to adjust the y-axis on the illegal encounters graph.  With roughly 9,700 daily encounters, this dwarfs the definition of a "crisis" set by Obama's DHS Secretary Jeh Johnson when he said in 2019 that "more than 1,000" encounters a day "overwhelms the system."  December's 300,000-plus encounters is a 460 percent increase from the average number of October apprehensions from 2017-2020. [...] At least 49 people on the terror watchlist have been encountered trying to enter the U.S. between ports of entry this fiscal year.

J6 Political Hostage and Army Veteran William Chrestman Sentenced To 4.5 Years In Prison For Walking in US Capitol.  US District Judge Timothy Kelly sentenced Army veteran Wiliam "Billy" Chrestman to four and half years in prison Friday for protesting the stolen election outside of the US Capitol on January 6, 2021.  Prosecutors sought 63 months, or more than five years, for Chrestman.  "I honestly feel I've spent more than enough time behind bars," Chrestman told The Gateway Pundit hours after he was sentenced. "I've been in the DC Gulag for three years.  I committed no violence or vandalism on January 6th, 2021."

How could President Biden not notice his defense secretary was missing?  With US forces under regular attack across the Mideast and the Navy actively engaged with Houthi forces in the Red Sea, Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin was out of commission in the hospital from Monday on.  Worse, no one told the White House; worse yet, neither President Biden nor National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan noticed.  Not until the Pentagon let Sullivan know on Thursday.  Anyone thinking that the nation is well-led despite Biden's blatant feebleness better think again:  Austin and his deputies ignored the law here, while Sullivan was plainly asleep at the switch.  Again, with American forces regularly under fire, and our friends in Ukraine and Israel fully at war with Russia and Hamas.  Oh, and the public was kept in the dark until Friday.

SBF Charges Dropped Proves System Is Rigged.  Nothing to see here.  Move along.  That is the message from the prosecutor in the Sam Bankman-Fried case, as he notified the judge that the government would not be pursuing a trial in the charges not adjudicated in SBF's trial over defrauding customers.  What charges are affected?  Maybe it really is no big deal since the prosecutor tells us that the judge has all the information he needs to sentence SBF to a nice long sentence.  The charges that are dropped relate to bribery of politicians and illegal campaign contributions. [...] These days the elite is no longer even trying to pretend that there is equal justice under the law.  We've seen this time and again.  The FBI abuses its power and targets the politically inconvenient; the justice system prosecutes and imprisons conservatives while letting Leftist rioters off; prosecutors allow thugs to run riot in cities while inventing crimes with which to charge Donald Trump.

DOJ accused of covering for 'deep state' by not holding second SBF trial on illegal political donations.  The decision to avoid a second trial charging Sam Bankman-Fried with a conspiracy to make unlawful political donations and bribery of foreign officials has many conservatives up in arms.  Federal prosecutors said Friday [12/29/2023] that they do not plan to proceed with a second trial against Sam Bankman-Fried, citing public interest in a speedy resolution of the case that has seemingly irritated those who were hoping to see the disgraced FTX founder prosecuted to the fullest extent.  In a Friday letter filed in federal court in Manhattan, prosecutors said they do "not plan to proceed with a second trial" as "much of the evidence that would be offered in a second trial was already offered in the first trial and can be considered by the Court at the defendant's March 2024 sentencing."

Police video shows police knew Maine shooter was a threat.  They also felt confronting him was unsafe.  Police in Maine feared confronting an Army reservist prior to the worst mass shooting in state history would "throw a stick of dynamite on a pool of gas," according to footage released by law enforcement.  The videos were released to the Portland Press Herald and then sent to The Associated Press on Friday [12/22/2023].  Robert Card, a 40-year-old Army reservist, committed the deadliest mass shooting in Maine history when he killed 18 people at a bowling alley and a bar on Oct. 25 in Lewiston.

House Speaker Mike Johnson Announces Total Release of J6 Footage.  Soon, all Americans will be able to view the entire footage of the riot at the U.S. Capitol building that occurred on Jan. 6, 2021.  House Speaker Mike Johnson announced on Friday that he would be releasing the J6 footage in all of its totality to the public.  The move could mark a significant shift in the ongoing discourse and narratives surrounding the events of that day.  In a post on X, formerly known as Twitter, Johnson made the announcement.  "Today, I am keeping my promise to the American people and making all the January 6th tapes available to ALL Americans."  [Tweet]

More about the January 6, 2021, incident at the U.S. Capitol.

US halts exports of most civilian firearms for 90 days.  The U.S. has stopped issuing export licenses for most civilian firearms and ammunition for 90  days for all non-governmental users, the Commerce Department said on Friday, citing national security and foreign policy interests.  The Commerce Department did not provide further details for the pause, which also includes shotguns and optical sights, but said an urgent review will assess the "risk of firearms being diverted to entities or activities that promote regional instability, violate human rights, or fuel criminal activities." [...] Export licences for Ukraine and Israel, as well as some other close allies, will be exempted from the temporary halt in exports.

IRS Can Enter 'Anyone's House at Any Time': Abuse Detailed in New Weaponization Report.  An IRS agent showed up at the door of a Marion County, Ohio, woman and lied about his reason for being there.  Once inside, the Internal Revnue Service agent, purporting to be named Bill Haus, began to harass and intimidate the taxpayer, according to a congressional report released Friday.  The woman called a lawyer, who told the IRS agent to leave the home since the taxpayer had gotten no prior notice of unpaid taxes.  "I am an IRS agent.  I can be at and go into anyone's house at any time I want to be," responded the agent, who was using a phony name, according to the report from the House Judiciary Select Subcommittee on the Weaponization of the Federal Government.  Under pressure from Congress, the IRS discontinued its policy of unannounced home visits in July.

How Did Biden Manage To Lose $300 Billion?  Friday afternoon, the Treasury Department reported that, despite a growing economy and low unemployment, the federal deficit shot up by $320 billion in fiscal year 2023.  That's unusual.  But what's really bizarre is why the deficit exploded.  According to the report, overall spending actually dropped by 2% compared with 2022 as the COVID-19 spending splurge abated.  What drove up the deficit this year was a sudden and completely unexpected 9% drop in tax revenues.  Not only did revenues come up hundreds of billions lower than last year, but they were well below what everybody expected them to be.  At the start of the year, the Treasury Department and the Office of Management and Budget projected revenues for fiscal 2023 at around $4.7 trillion.  The Congressional Budget Office figured it would be $4.8 trillion.  The actual amount:  $4.4 trillion.  In other words, there's between $300 billion and $400 billion worth of missing tax revenues.

SCOTUS Takes Up Free Speech Case.  Late Friday, the Supreme Court agreed to hear Missouri v. Biden, a case that may end the Biden administration's circumvention of the First Amendment by outsourcing censorship to Big Tech.  The case was initially filed by the states of Missouri and Louisiana, along with various private plaintiffs who allege that social media platforms censored them at the behest of federal agencies.  U.S. District Judge Terry Doughty ruled for the plaintiffs on July 4, enjoining the agencies from communicating with platforms about "content moderation."  The Biden administration sought relief from the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals and lost again, making a Supreme Court clash inevitable.

Pfizer Crashes After Slashing Profit Guidance By More Than Half On Collapsing Demand For Covid Meds.  Pfizer just lobbed a legendary Friday evening bomb when it slashed its revenue and earnings forecasts for the year as it agreed to take returns from the US of its Covid antiviral Paxlovid amid collapsing demand.  Waiting patiently until after the market closed on Friday, the company said it now sees 2023 revenue of only $58 billion to $61 billion, down $9 billion from its previous estimate of $67 billion to $70 billion.

Biden admin issues restrictions on gas furnaces in latest war on appliances.  The Biden administration announced its latest regulatory action targeting home appliances late Friday, this time targeting popular home gas-powered furnaces.  The Department of Energy (DOE) said the energy efficiency regulations would slash household utility costs by $1.5 billion on an annual basis while reducing greenhouse gas emissions from the residential sector.  The proposal, according to the agency, require non-weatherized gas furnaces and those used in mobile homes to achieve a far higher level of efficiency than cheaper models on the market.  "At the direction of Congress, DOE is continuing to review and finalize energy standards for household appliances, such as residential furnaces, to lower costs for working families by reducing energy use and slashing harmful pollutants in homes across the nation," Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm said in a statement.

Friday Afternoon Statistic Dump — Border Patrol Reports Over 7.5 million Illegal Aliens Released into U.S. During Biden Term.  The Dept of Homeland Security, Customs and Border Patrol (CBP) waiting until Friday afternoon to [release] the latest statistics on illegal alien apprehensions at the U.S. southern border.  As a current surge is underway, the August apprehension rate was 304,162, the highest of any month so far on record.  Since Joe Biden took office over 7.5 million illegal aliens have been encountered and released into the United States.  Of that number 5.18 million were single adult males.  This is a wholesale invasion of illegal aliens on a scale never before fathomed.  Joe Biden has created this crisis, and it is getting worse.

Biden Lays a Booby Trap for a Republican President.  The Biden administration is setting a booby trap in case a Republican wins the presidency in 2024.  On Friday, the White House unveiled a proposed rule that would make it even harder than in the past for an incoming Republican president to wrestle control of the left-leaning federal bureaucracy and actually implement the conservative policies promised to voters.

Greenwich High School Surprises With New Digital ID And Surveillance App, Parents Not Informed Until After Students Told To Download App On Personal Phone.  On September 14, 2023, Greenwich High School (GHS) students received a notification from Karen Foster, the Director of Student Activities, immediately requiring them to download the Minga app onto their phones because the school had decided to implement digital IDs in order to track them and to provide important announcements.  Physical IDs will not be provided to students with phones. [...] Parents were not notified about this sweeping invasion of privacy until Friday evening — well after many students had already complied with this latest intrusion by Superintendent Toni Jones.

Special Counsel Jack Smith Files to Shut Trump Up.  In a late Friday evening news dump it was revealed Special Counsel Jack Smith filed a motion earlier this week seeking a gag order against former President Donald Trump.  The motion was unsealed by U.S. District Court Judge Tanya Chutkan who is overseeing Smith's January 6 case against Trump.  "On Friday afternoon, U.S. District Court Judge Tanya Chutkan unsealed filings revealing the government's week-old request, arguing that Trump is undermining the fairness of the proceedings through "disparaging and inflammatory attacks" on prosecutors, witnesses and the judge in the case," POLITICO first reported.  In the motion, Smith requests Chutkan limit what Trump is allowed to say about DOJ prosecutors, the FBI, Chutkan, Republican presidential candidate and former Vice President Mike Pence, former Attorney General Bill Barr and more.

Can Biden's Jobs Number Be Trusted Any More?  President Joe Biden has staked so much on his claim that he's "created" 13.5 million jobs since taking office that it's worth asking if his Labor Department is now goosing job growth figures to help him out.  On Friday just before the holiday weekend, Labor released its estimates for job growth in August — which it said worked out to 187,000, beating economists' forecasts.  But at the same time, the government cut the job growth numbers for the previous two months by a total of 110,000.  As a matter of fact, Labor has quietly cut its initial job growth estimates for every month this year.

Hunter Biden document dump over the weekend.  If you have been following the Hunter Biden legal case over the past thousand years or so, this weekend's revelations should interest you. [...] I would speculate that they were leaked by Hunter's team for their own reasons. [...] Biden's attorneys wanted an ironclad deal in writing to ensure no future prosecution, which eventually led to the current mess everybody has found themselves in.  Weiss was prepared to drop the matter entirely, but when the IRS whistleblowers came forward he decided he needed some face-saving plea from Biden.  With such explosive charges on the table, he needed to at least give Hunter a haircut.

6 Takeaways From The Hunter Biden Special Counsel Appointment You Won't Hear From Big Media.  Friday's news dump featured an announcement by Attorney General Merrick Garland that he had named Delaware U.S. Attorney David Weiss as special counsel to continue the investigation into Hunter Biden "as well as any matters that arose from that investigation or may arise from the Special Counsel's investigation."  While the official appointment order barely filled a page and the attorney general's accompanying comments provided little additional texture, the news is hugely significant.

The President Finally recognized his grandkid in a slimy statement snuck out Friday.  Joe Biden has apparently decided that its become a political liability to be a bad granddad.  So, in an exclusive statement to People Magazine on Friday, the President conceded, for the first-time, that he has seven grandkids, not six.  Did you miss that news?  In fact, that's exactly what the cynical old man in the White House and his campaign team wanted.  Why else would they make the announcement to a celebrity news website at 5:02 PM ET on a summer Friday, when the thoughts of most Americans have mercifully wandered from politics to barbecues, pools and family.

Biden admin crackdown on water heaters would go into effect in 2029 as it targets more home appliances.  The Biden administration's newest crackdown on home appliances, specifically water heaters, would take effect in 2029 if its regulatory proposal is enacted as it continues to implement its aggressive energy efficiency campaign.  White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre on Monday acknowledged the president was going after home appliances.  The newest target is water heaters.  A Department of Energy (DOE) proposal released late Friday said new regulations would ultimately "accelerate deployment" of electric heat pump water heaters, claiming it would save Americans billions of dollars and reduce carbon emissions.

The Editor says...
[#1] Why does the Department of Energy exist?  [#2] Unfortunately, I have a "heat pump" HVAC system in my house.  If the outdoor temperature exceeds 102°F., which happens very often in the summer, the air conditioner can't catch up.  In the winter, if the outdoor temperature goes below 40°F., the heat pump can't cut it.  The heat pump hasn't saved any money because it almost never stops.  When it's 20° outside, is a heat pump really going to make 40 gallons of water hot enough to wash dishes?  Of course not.  Is this innovation going to "save American billions of dollars," when only about 8 million^* water heaters are sold every year?  Certainly not.  [##] If a new type of appliance has any merit, the free market will get it into every home, without the government having to mandate it.

GOP lawmakers slam Biden administration's proposed clamp down on home water heaters.  Water heaters could soon be subject to much more stringent efficiency requirements if a recent Department of Energy proposal that has been criticized by Republican lawmakers goes into effect.  In a draft rule unveiled Friday, the Biden administration is seeking to compel most electric water heaters to deploy heat pump technology and gas-fired ones to use condensing technology.

Biden administration proposes tighter efficiency rule for new home water heaters.  The Biden administration on Friday proposed tightening an efficiency standard for new residential water heaters — a move that it said would both save consumers money and combat climate change.  The draft rule would require that, in order to become more efficient, most common-size electric water heaters use heat pump technology and gas-powered heaters use condensing technology.  The proposal from the Energy Department would cut 501 million metric tons of carbon dioxide emissions over 30 years, the department said.  That's the equivalent of the emissions of 134 coal-fired power plants in one year.

The Editor says...
First of all, nobody has provided any reason to avoid the release of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere, and even if such a reason exists, India and China are ignoring it.  Second, any assertion that this new rule will "save consumers money and combat climate change" is a lie.  Competition and free markets save the consumers money.  The consumers will decide what kind of technology suits them.  Capitalism works great, for everybody but the government bureaucrats.  No rule or law will "combat climate change."  All the laws in the world will not stop "cold and heat, and summer and winter, and day and night."^*  Any time the federal government wants to mandate some technology that is not already widely popular, it means the technology will be less efficient, more costly, more inconvenient, and less reliable.  Why?  Because if everybody switched over to heat pumps and really liked them, the rest of us would have already bought heat pumps by now.  If nobody liked natural gas stoves, the market would have phased them out by now.  Always assume that the politician who is gung ho about solar-powered doorstops (or something equally stupid) is a politician whose brother-in-law is in that business.

Did U.S. Attorney David Weiss Confirm IRS Whistleblower's Allegations?  Last month, we learned from IRS whistleblower Gary Shapley that U.S. Attorney David Weiss told multiple witnesses the DOJ had instructed him not to pursue charges against Hunter Biden in California and Washington, D.C.  This conflicted with Weiss's and Attorney General Merrick Garland's public assertions that Weiss had complete authority in his investigation.  The New York Times confirmed Shapley's claims last week, and now Weiss has confirmed them as well.  House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jim Jordan (R-Ohio) recently called on Weiss to clarify his past claims of having full authority, giving him a deadline of July 6 to respond.  Weiss responded on Friday night in a letter.

U.S. Attorney David Weiss' Response to Jim Jordan Is the Definition of a 'Friday News Dump'.  U.S. Attorney David Weiss has caused plenty of confusion when it comes to whether or not he has had full authority to charge Hunter Biden.  House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jim Jordan (R-OH) had recently sent him a letter demanding clarification about a letter Weiss had sent to the Committee indicating he had full authority, in response to a letter that Jordan had sent to Attorney General Merrick Garland.  Jordan had given Weiss a deadline of July 6.  Almost a full week before the deadline, though, Weiss sent a letter to Jordan on Friday night.  It's not only a "Friday night news dump," it's one before the holiday weekend.  IRS whistleblower Gary Shapling had said that Weiss did not actually have the full authority to bring charges and that he told six witnesses he did not.  Shapling has given interviews as well as gone before congressional committees.  Last week, however, Attorney General Merrick Garland had indicated that Weiss did have such authority.  The crux of the letter is that Shapling was right, though it took some time for Weiss' letter to get there.

Friday night document dump: Afghanistan pullout a huge failure, State Department report says.  Slipped out under the radar ahead of a long Fourth of July weekend on a Friday night, the State Department's report on the U.S. pullout on Afghanistan in 2021 is out, and it's a beaut. [...] As usual, the Biden administration was concerned about 'optics' -- to the very point of putting American lives at danger, leaving some ten thousand allies behind, flying in more than ten thousand Afghani illegals with no right to be here, and ruining American prestige abroad as China cleaned up in Iraq on its oil, and Russia launched plans to invade Ukraine.  Note the Jimmy Carteresque reasoning on failing to make plans because they didn't want to send any signals suggesting that they could imagine any problems post-pullout ... so, they didn't plan for any problems, either.  These things are on Biden, and the complete failure to plan for problems during the pullout.  Biden further completed the public-relations focus on the disaster by hiding from the public at Camp David while the disaster was unfolding, while Secretary of State Antony Blinken had more important business to take care of in the Hamptons as U.S. troops were losing their lives to a suicide bomber and American standing abroad was crashing and burning.

Biden Admin Pulls a Fast One, Swiftly Changed Status of Five Foreign Terror Groups Friday.  In a time-honored move known as the Friday news dump, with our federal government discarding any news or documents it would prefer to be buried and see little to no serious examination or media coverage, the Biden Administration informed Congress on Friday [5/13/2022] that it is about to move five foreign terror groups off the so-called blacklist. [...] The reporting by Fox News on this story brings up something RedState has kept an eye on for a while:  the concept that the Biden Administration, which has shown it is too lax for comfort about the safety and security of the American people, might be making this move as a test-run of sorts for removing another group from the list:  the Iranian Revolutionary Guard.

Flynn Attorney Sidney Powell Releases Statement on Flynn Transcripts.  DNI John Ratcliffe released the Flynn-Kislyak transcripts on Friday afternoon [5/29/2020].  Ratcliffe sent the transcripts to Senators Grassley, Ron Johnson.  The transcripts were copied to Democrat Senators Dianne Feinstein and Mark Warner and Marco Rubio, Devin Nunes and Adam Schiff.  Senator Chuck Grassley (R-IA) released the transcripts on Friday afternoon.

Mueller Report Fizzles.  Prepare For The Reckoning.  First of all, of course everyone should wait to see the contents of the actual Mueller report before drawing any specific final conclusions about it.  But here are some laws of nature in the modern age:  If that report contained a fraction of the damaging material breathlessly awaited in the media culture for two years, there would be some smoke signal of it.  Instead, we saw an actual finding from the Justice Department that there would be no further indictments from the probe.  No indictment of Trump.  No indictment of anyone associated with the campaign or the administration to support the narrative of Russia collusion.  Also, timing is everything.  Friday's close of business is where stories go to die.  As the Mueller report seized the news late in the day, TV viewership was a fraction of what it would have been on a Monday morning or a Wednesday midday.

Robert Mueller submits full report on Russia probe.  Special counsel Robert Mueller has submitted his report on Russian meddling in the US election and possible collusion with the Trump campaign to Attorney General William Barr, the Justice Department said Friday [3/21/2019].  Justice notified Congress late Friday that it had received Mueller's report but did not disclose any of its conclusions.

DHS Chooses Late Friday Afternoon to Announce 15,000 more H-2B Visas.  The Department of Homeland Security announced at 3:46 pm today that it will allow various U.S. employers 15,000 additional H-2B workers this summer; they will do unskilled, non-agricultural seasonal work.  Most work in landscaping or forestry; agricultural workers come in on the H-2A visa.  The 15,000 will be in addition to the 66,000 permits in this program that have already been issued in keeping with the long-standing statutory ceiling.

State Department releases Huma Abedin emails found on Anthony Weiner's laptop.  The State Department on Friday [12/29/2017] released a batch of work-related emails from the account of top Hillary Clinton aide Huma Abedin that were discovered by the FBI on a laptop belonging to Abedin's estranged husband, Anthony Weiner, near the end of the 2016 presidential campaign.  At least four of the documents released Friday are marked "classified."  One November 2010 document that was released shows Abedin forwarding an email to an address titled "Anthony Campaign."  Former FBI Director James Comey said during a congressional hearing earlier this year that he believed Abedin regularly forwarded emails to Weiner for him to print out so she could give them to Clinton.

Anthony Weiner had classified emails belonging to wife Huma Abedin on his laptop.  At least five emails determined to be classified were found among 2,800 documents stored on a laptop belonging to Anthony Weiner, whose then-wife Huma Abedin was deputy chief of staff to then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.  The State Department released hundreds of pages of materials Friday afternoon [12/29/2017], including a total of eight pages classified at the 'confidential level,' the third most sensitive level the U.S. government uses.  The confidential classification level is applied to information whose unauthorized disclosure 'reasonably could be expected to cause damage to national security,'

A list of Friday document dumps:
Obama Administration Announces 144 Big Regulations Right Before Thanksgiving.  President Obama is nothing if not predictable.  Required by law to release plans for new regulations twice a year, the administration has consistently done so just before major holidays, when few are paying attention.  Thus, it was no surprise to see his fall 2015 regulatory agenda released last Friday, as many Americans focused on Thanksgiving week with family and friends.

FBI Quietly Releases 300 Pages Of Hillary Clinton Investigation Records.  The FBI quietly released nearly 300 pages of records from its investigation of Hillary Clinton's private email server on Sunday night [1/8/2017].  This is the fifth release of Clinton investigation records from the FBI.  The documents deal with the handling of computer hardware collected from Clinton's lawyers for the investigation and also contain emails from FBI officials discussing the classification of Clinton's emails.

The Mysterious FBI Sunday Document Dump #5 and The "Missing" Clinton Seagate Hard Drive.  As many of you are aware the FBI mysteriously dumped 300 pages of investigative material in an unusual Sunday evening document dump.  The timing and content of the FBI release are curious and a few people are attempting to understand what's going on.  It has taken us a full day to look over the #5 release and scour it for information.  There's some rather interesting findings.  What follows below may possibly indicate a motive, and might also outline an internal effort within the FBI to push forward:  a.) action by President Obama on behalf of Hillary Clinton, vis-a-vis a pardon; or, b.) action by the incoming administration to ensure criminal charges.

FBI Dumps 300 Hillary Pages of Documents on Sunday Night.  The FBI published around 300 pages of documents associated with Hillary Clinton's email investigation on Sunday night [1/8/2017] when the most of us enjoyed football, hockey, or the Golden Globes. [...] Back in October, reports surfaced over possible "quid pro quo" between the State Department and FBI over the reclassification of the emails.  An FBI official said that Undersecretary of State Patrick Kennedy bribed him to change some of the emails.  Kennedy said "in exchange for marking the email unclassified, STATE would reciprocate by allowing the FBI to place more Agents in countries where they are presently forbidden. [...] Kennedy tried to convince the officials "to issue a B9 FOIA exemption on another email that 'caused problems for Kennedy' so that it would 'end up in the basement' 'never to be seen again.'"  Yeah, that email had to do with the Benghazi attacks.

FBI deletes details about hacking effort in document release.  The FBI has released 100 pages of heavily censored documents related to its agreement with an unidentified vendor to hack into an iPhone used by one of the San Bernardino, California, shooters, but it did not identify whom it paid to perform the work or how much it cost.

FBI blacks out most details on hack of terrorist's iPhone.  A heavily redacted Friday evening data dump by the FBI revealed almost nothing about how the agency was able to break into the locked iPhone of one of the gunmen in the December terrorist attack in San Bernardino.  The Justice Department released close to 100 pages of records in response to a lawsuit by USA TODAY and two other news organizations.  The suit, filed on September 16, 2016, sought information about how the agency was able to break into a locked iPhone used by Syed Rizwan Farook.  The attack by Farook and his wife, Tashfeen Malik, killed 14 people and wounded 22 others.  Malik pledged allegiance to the Islamic State as the attack began.

Obama Quietly Signs the "Countering Disinformation and Propaganda Act" Into Law.  Late on Friday [12/23/2016], with the US population embracing the upcoming holidays and oblivious of most news emerging from the administration, Obama quietly signed into law the 2017 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) which authorizes $611 billion for the military in 2017. [...] But while the passage of the NDAA — and the funding of the US military — was hardly a surprise, the biggest news is what was buried deep inside the provisions of the Defense Authortization Act.  Recall that as we reported in early June, "a bill to implement the U.S.' very own de facto Ministry of Truth had been quietly introduced in Congress.  As with any legislation attempting to dodge the public spotlight the Countering Foreign Propaganda and Disinformation Act of 2016 marks a further curtailment of press freedom and another avenue to stultify avenues of accurate information.

Air Force Announces It Will Mandate Diversity Quotas In Candidate Pools For Key Positions.  The Air Force announced a new set of 13 inclusion initiatives Friday [9/30/2016] with the goal of ensuring the force isn't as white, male and heterosexual as it is now.  Air Force officials are intent on building upon a foundation of nine initiatives from 2015, in order to boost diversity.  Those nine initiatives weren't enough to make the Air Force as diverse as desired, which is why it is taking more intensive steps in 2016.

Obama Administration Admits Their Omar Mateen Narrative Was [a Lie].  Months after the fact, it comes out, in the form of one those Friday night document drops the regime uses when they wasnt to bury a story, that Omar Mateen had been heavily invested in ISIS propaganda for a long time.

FBI doc dump on email case reveals role of 'confidential' Clinton aide.  The details were contained in the latest document dump of FBI files on Clinton's personal email use.  The FBI chose late Friday afternoon [9/23/2016] to release nearly 200 highly redacted pages of so-called "302" files from the bureau's investigation, a release that quickly became overshadowed by the impending presidential debate Monday.  But the files included new details of the tech intervention by Clinton aide Huma Abedin and Clinton Foundation official Justin Cooper — and a third individual, a Hillary Clinton aide named Monica Hanley.

Orlando killer repeatedly referenced ISIS, transcript shows.  Omar Mateen, the gunman who killed 49 people at the Pulse nightclub in Orlando in June, repeatedly told a police hostage negotiator that he was a soldier of ISIS and that the United States had to stop its bombing in Syria and Iraq, according to a police transcript released Friday [9/23/2016].

27 things we learned from Clinton's FBI files.  A 189-page summary of interviews conducted in the year-long investigation of Hillary Clinton's private server shed new light on the shifting stories Clinton's aides told agents.  The report, which was made public Friday evening [9/23/2016], came on the heels of House Republicans' revelation that three additional witnesses had received immunity agreements from the Justice Department, bringing the total number of witnesses who were shielded from prosecution to five.  Here are 27 new details that emerged from the latest FBI documents.

Obama reportedly used pseudonym to email with Clinton on her private server.  President Obama used a pseudonym when sending or receiving emails through the private server system Hillary Clinton used as secretary of state, according to nearly 200 pages of documents released Friday [9/23/2016] by the FBI.

How's the Coverup Going, Hillary?  Yesterday the FBI did another Friday afternoon document dump, consisting of more documents relating to its investigation of Hillary Clinton's email security breaches.  The Washington Examiner spotted this hilarious item from an interview of a Platte River Networks employee who referred in 2014 to "the Hilary coverup operation."

What Happens When You Can't Trust the FBI and the Department of Justice?  In a stunning Friday (isn't it always?) revelation, we found out that yet another key figure from Hillary Clinton's "rat pack" — her former chief-of-staff Cheryl Mills — was given immunity in the email server investigation.  As Ed Morrissey points out, that makes "at least five" — who knows how many there really are — who have received this treatment.  So far that's techies Bryan Pagliano and Paul Combetta (more of him in a moment), John Bentel of the Office of Information Resources Management, and Heather Samuelson, an aide to Mrs. Clinton.  How much the public knows of their immunized testimony is clear — nothing.

Judge Nap:  FBI Report Could Be 'Catastrophic Politically' for Hillary.  On "Fox and Friends" this morning [9/6/2016], Judge Napolitano explained that Clinton told FBI investigators — who were looking into her mishandling of state secrets — that she was unaware what it meant if documents were marked "classified," "secret" or "top secret."  "That sort of obliviousness lessens the criminality in the mind of the FBI, but that sort of obliviousness, is that what you want in the mind of a secretary of state or of a president of the United States?" Judge Napolitano said.

The FBI Found Clinton's Smoking Gun, Threw It Away, and Told Us on Labor Day Weekend.  It's Labor Day weekend, and I'm doing exactly what the FBI, the mainstream media, and Hillary Clinton expect me to be doing today.  Nothing.  Maybe some football.  Not reading through the FBI's notes on the Clinton investigation.  In this, their scheme worked.  Dump the data when America is completely disconnected and distracted, knowing that sometime in the next 48 hours Donald Trump will save Clinton by doing or saying something to make a headline.  The country will move on by Tuesday.

9 Questions Regarding Hillary Clinton, Cheryl Mills, and the FBI's Labor Day Document Dump.  If Hillary gets away with this, blame the FBI, DOJ, the total lack of regard for the rule of law, but most of all, blame American citizens.  If the American people are so asleep at the wheel that they elect a criminal to office, they deserve what they get.

FBI holiday weekend document drop is devastating to Hillary.  The decision to wait for late Friday on Labor Day weekend to release the FBI's investigation notes of Hillary Clinton's email practices offers further evidence of the politicization of the agency.  As the United States slides into a banana republic, we now know that a political thumb is on the scale at the two most feared federal agencies:  the IRS and the FBI.  Still, one can understand why the Hillary faction wanted to obscure the documents, for they contain toxic revelations that disqualify Hillary Clinton from the presidency.

FBI Releases Hillary Clinton Email Investigation Files.  On Friday, the Federal Bureau of Investigation released its interview with Hillary Clinton regarding the former Secretary of State's handling of classified information. [...] The documents reveal that, during her time in office, Clinton lost several mobile telephones carrying e-mails from her private server.  Clinton's top-aide Huma Abedin and former Clinton aide Monica Hanley indicated, according to the report, that "the whereabouts of Clinton's [mobile] devices would frequently become unknown once she transitioned to a new device."  Abedin also admitted that the former Secretary of State was accustomed to using the 8th floor balcony of the State Department building to check her emails — despite knowing she was not allowed to use her mobile devices in her office, the files reveal.

This Friday Afternoon FBI Clinton Document Dump is [Unfair].  Friday afternoon [9/2/2016] just as everybody was getting ready to leave for the long holiday weekend, why of course, the FBI decided to release the damning files from their Hillary Clinton investigation! [...] Despite the overall inconvenience/bitterness from us journalists, today's document dump ensures that pretty much no one from the public will focus their attention on what the FBI found — including revelations about how Clinton apparently doesn't remembering going through training regarding the handling of classified information or — how she didn't know that "C" meant classified.  By Tuesday, all of that will be old news.  This isn't the first time that the FBI's timing as it relates to the Clinton investigation has drawn scrutiny.

Post-Convention News Dump:  Obama Lets Some US Planes Land in Iran.  The Obama administration has approved U.S. civilian jets owned by foreign carriers to travel to Iran for 72 hours, according to a notice issued by the U.S. Treasury late Friday afternoon [7/29/2016].  The announcement came less than 24 hours after the Democratic National Convention concluded in Philadelphia, and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton accepted her party's nomination for the presidency.  Clinton backed the Iran deal, and has taken credit for helping start the talks, with an adviser saying she was "centrally involved" at the time.

Obama Orders Fed Agencies to Stop Asking Job Applicants about Criminal History.  To make public-sector jobs more accessible to convicts, President Obama has issued a new order prohibiting federal agencies from asking candidates about criminal history when applying for positions.  It's part of the commander-in-chief's mission to reduce barriers to reentry and employment for incarcerated individuals once they leave jail.  The new measure, announced in a Friday media dump, will affect tens of thousands of federal government positions funded with taxpayer dollars.  Government often tries to escape fallout by burying controversial or bad news right before the weekend, but it's difficult to keep this outrageous development below the radar.

State Department releases more than 1,100 documents to Benghazi committee.  The State Department on Friday turned over more than 1,100 pages of records to the House Select Committee on Benghazi, over a year after the committee first requested them for their ongoing investigation into the 2012 terror attack on the U.S. consulate in Libya.  The committee's chairman, Rep.  Trey Gowdy, R-S.C., also criticized the State Department's delayed response to the request.  The records released included emails from then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton's then-chief of staff, Cheryl Mills, and Clinton aides Jake Sullivan, Human Abedin, as well as then-U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Susan Rice, according to a statement from the Congressional committee.

State Dept. releases personal emails from Clinton's inner circle.  State Department officials on Friday handed over 1,100 pages of documents demanded by the the House Select Committee on Benghazi, two years after congressional investigators requested them.  "It is deplorable that it took over a year for these records to be produced to our committee, and that our Democrat colleagues never lifted a finger to help us get them," committee Chairman Trey Gowdy, R-S.C., said Friday evening.  "Shame on them and everyone else who has demanded this committee to give up before gathering all of the facts."

Obama relents on Fast & Furious executive privilege, turns records over to Congress.  The Obama administration caved to a judge's order Friday [4/8/2016] and sent documents from the botched Fast & Furious gun-running operation to Congress, complying with a subpoena the House Oversight Committee issued years ago.  President Obama had claimed executive privilege in trying to shield the documents from Congress, but a federal judge rejected that, insisting lawmakers had a right to see the information in order to complete their investigation into an operation that saw thousands of guns trafficked into Mexico, with the administration's knowledge.  With just hours to go before the judge's 60-day deadline, the administration complied Friday [4/8/2016].

If you can't prosecute Hillary Clinton, then you can't prosecute Edward Snowden.  In the latest Friday night document dump 2,000 Hillary Clinton emails were made public.  Twenty two of them were not released, as they were considered "too damaging" to even release in redacted form.  The State Department has been dragging its feet in releasing the Clinton emails and won't meet a Court ordered deadline to release the remaining emails due to an "internal oversight."  Now the Clinton campaign wants the Top Secret emails made public.

Hillary Clinton Campaign Meltdown: Top-Secret Emails 'Innocuous,' Should Be Released.  This week's Friday afternoon news drop was a blockbuster for Hillary Clinton, with revelations that some of her emails contained information so sensitive they cannot be released to the public at all, others will be delayed beyond the first few primaries by the State Department, and the number of Top Secret documents in her homebrew private email server has risen to 22.

Last Night's State Department Email Dump: The Most Damning for Hillary Yet.  With a classification rate of nearly 27 percent, this was the most highly classified batch of emails yet, despite the fact the State Department only produced 10 percent of the emails it was required to under court order.  And given the State Department's claim that many of the emails they withheld were still being reviewed by other agencies as well as the steep increase in the number of emails classified as 'SECRET,' it appears Hillary Clinton's email woes are only going to get worse.  Indeed, many redactions in last night's production had to do with information from several intelligence agencies including the CIA.  No wonder Clinton's friends in the State Department are trying to delay further releases until she's cleared the early nominating contests.  Here are some of the most eye-popping emails from last night's release [...]

Another Friday night Hillary Email Dump — minus the 22 Top Secret ones.  It's Friday night.  So the State Department just released a new batch of Hillary emails.

Feds dump heavily redacted Benghazi emails on Christmas Eve.  The documents, released ahead of the Christmas holiday, include mostly blacked-out emails and some press clippings about events in Libya after the attack on the U.S. embassy, which left four Americans dead.  The event has become a central part of Republican criticism of Hillary Clinton's time as Secretary of State as she runs for president.  A few of the heavily redacted emails discuss the drafting of an assessment of the threat level before the attack occurred.  Congress had requested the assessment in the months after the attack.

The surprising reason behind Obama's aggressive drive to regulate you more.  As is the wont of the self-described most transparent administration in history, Obama issued a massive, record-setting list of upcoming rules late last week in the shadow of a national holiday.  You may have missed the latest list of 2,000 aggressive new rules, including 144 that will cost at least $100 million each.  You were supposed to miss the list, the Unified Agenda.  It's set by law, but not the surreptitious timing.  There'll be hundreds more on another list in six months.  Rules on employers, banks, restaurants, importers.  You name it.

Obama Turns Thanksgiving Into Rulesgiving.  With little fanfare, the White House announced more than 2,000 new regulations — including 144 deemed "economically significant" — just before Thanksgiving.  The law requires doing this twice a year, and Obama has followed it faithfully — repeatedly releasing rafts of costly new rules just days before holidays, when people are most distracted and not paying attention.  Luckily, Heritage Foundation fellow James Gattuso is paying attention.  He notes that the 144 new economically significant rules is a record, breaking the previous high of 136 set just last spring.

Obama Makes an Announcement Right Before Thanksgiving.  Obama is doubling and tripling down on regulations that will oppress Americans even more.  And guess what?  He did it just before Thanksgiving.  He always does this just before a holiday, so people will be too busy to notice until it's too late.  This set of regulations breaks records and the bank at the same time.  Over 2,000 new regulations alone are in this batch.  144 are deemed 'significant' as they will each cost $100 million and up.  Obama had 136 of these 'significant' regulations last spring.  He's spending as fast as he can to drive us off the fiscal cliff and into the abyss before he leaves.

Obama Quietly Releases Plans For 2,224 Regulations Ahead Of Turkey Day.  While millions of Americans prepare to stuff themselves with Turkey and pie, the Obama administration quietly released its plans for 2,224 federal rules Friday [11/20/2015] — a preview of just how many more regulations the president is attempting to issue before he leaves office.  President Barack Obama's Unified Agenda for Fall 2015 is his administration's regulatory road map and lays out thousands of regulations being finalized in the coming months.  Obama has developed a habit of releasing the agenda late on Friday before a major holiday.

Huma Abedin, top Clinton aide, delivers 6,714 emails, 2,533 pages of documents.  Huma Abedin, former Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton's close personal aide, has turned over 6,714 emails, and 2,533 pages of documents in printed and electronic form, the Obama administration said in a court filing late Friday [9/11/2015].  Most of those materials were finally turned over Sept. 1, and though the majority came in electronic form already, they will still need to be converted to a searchable format, the State Department said.  The department said it will take 60 days to convert the messages, process them and begin releasing responsive documents.

'Friday news dump': And the suspected Chinese hacking scandal just got worse.  So it looks like the hack of government personal records just got a whole lot worse.  Now it's not just civilian employee records that were hacked, but information related to security clearances for members of the military and intelligence community as well.

While Hillary Slept.  Only the most conspiratorial among us suspected that the State Department's decision to release a tranche of Hillary Clinton's private emails on the Friday before a long holiday weekend just might be an effort to bury the revelations.

EPA Proposes Its Most Expensive Regulation to Date.  The strategy of publicly releasing bad news late on a Friday afternoon in order to avoid significant media scrutiny is well established and commonly employed by a variety of institutions.  For example, corporations may elect to bury a bad earnings report or government bodies may release unflattering documents just before the weekend when people are paying the least amount of attention. [...] Although today is not a Friday, it is the day before what will be a four-day holiday weekend for many Americans.  While most people will understandably be focusing on celebrating Thanksgiving with their families, the White House plans to quietly release plans for 3,415 new regulations, 189 of which will cost more than $100 million apiece.

Cover-up at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue.  [Scroll down]  A second intelligence source stated that "the announcement [of Petraeus' resignation] was carefully timed.  It was announced in a Friday afternoon news dump three days after the election, and days before the Senate Intelligence Committee was to hear his testimony, despite the President having knowledge of these events weeks ago.

Foodstamps Surge to All Time High.  The Obama administration has finally released its report on the number of Americans receiving food stamps.  This report was released days after the 2012 election, nine days past its traditional release date.  The numbers show that Americans on food stamps is at an all time high.  Worse, the report shows the highest one month jump ever recorded.

Foodstamps Surge to All Time High.  You may recall that just before the election, the Obama administration announced that Hurricane Sandy was going to delay the release of October's jobless numbers. [...] While the unemployment report was ultimately released on schedule and before the election, now we find out about another report, the food stamp report, delayed for nine days after its traditional release date.  This report was also supposed to have been released before the election.  This report is devastating.

Foodstamps Surge By Most In One Year To New All Time Record, In Delayed Release.  [Scroll down]  There was, however, another closely tracked number which perhaps is far more indicative of the economic "growth" in the past 4 years, which certainly had a delayed release.  The number of course is that showing how many Americans are on foodstamps, and usually is released at the end of the month, or the first day or two of the next month.  This time the USDA delayed its release nine days past the semi-official deadline, far past the election, and until Friday night to report August foodstamp data.

Obama Administration Hid Record Food Stamp Numbers Until After Election.  The Obama Administration hid the record food stamp numbers from the American public until after the election.

Not News: Food Stamp Participation Jumped by Over 600,000 in September; Last Pre-Election Number Revised Up.  The U.S. Department of Agriculture released its latest report on food stamp program participation through September today [12/7/2012].  I received the email alerting me to the release at 5:17 p.m., so it seems reasonable to believe that USDA and the Barack Obama administration wanted the new data to get as little attention as possible.  If so, they have two probable reasons for wishing to minimize its impact.

Administration's program halts 102,000 deportations.  The administration has issued stays of deportation for 102,965 illegal immigrants under President Obama's new non-deportation policy, officials announced Friday [12/14/2012].  Another 157,151 applications are still under review under the policy, officially known as Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, which grants a tentative legal status to illegal immigrants who qualify — though it does not grant them a path to citizenship.

New air pollution standards restrict soot particles.  The Obama administration announced a new air pollution standard Friday [12/14/2012] that would bring about a 20% reduction in microscopic particles of soot emitted by coal-fired power plants and diesel vehicles that contribute to haze and respiratory ailments.

ICE Scraps 287(g) Program That Allowed Local Police to Enforce Immigration Law.  Amid Hispanic calls for immigration leniency, the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement Agency is scrapping a program that allowed specially trained state and local law enforcement officers to enforce federal immigration law.  On Dec. 21, the Friday before Christmas, ICE announced that it has decided "not to renew any of its agreements with state and local law enforcement agencies that operate task forces under the 287(g) program."

ICE memos open another door to illegal alien amnesty-by-fiat.  On Friday [6/17/2012], in another trademark Obama document dump, ICE issued a memo that pushes the perpetually-rejected DREAM Act for illegal alien students.  As immigration lawyer Michelle Scopellite explained to me:  "In essence, what this means is that if someone, is not a major criminal and is in removal proceedings, ICE officers are now to release them or terminate proceedings if they are involved in a lawsuit or fighting for union ideals.  This appears to be another attempt by the Obama admin. to side-step immigration law through administrative acts.

Gov't Posts 61 New Federal Regulations, Including 500-Page Rule to Protect 'Critical Habitat' of Flycatcher.  The federal government posted 61 new regulations in the Federal Register on Friday [1/4/2013], including the Department of Interior's 500-page document outlining a new rule to protect the southwestern willow flycatcher's "critical habitat" in six states. [...] "The effect of this regulation is to conserve the flycatcher's habitat under the Endangered Species Act," the summary of the regulation states.

Obama administration delivers delayed regulatory agenda, could cost billions.  By law, each April and October, federal agencies are required to release an accounting of proposed regulations that will have an economically significant impact.  That didn't happen in 2012.  Instead, the Obama administration didn't release its 2012 regulatory agenda until on the Friday before Christmas.

Women in Combat: Why Did Obama Avoid Congress?  The most curious thing about outgoing Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta's decision this week to allow women to assume combat roles in the military was the timing.  It was announced just as departing Secretary of State Hillary Clinton was testifying on Capitol Hill about the Benghazi attack — and came without any advance notification to Congress, much to the annoyance of Republicans on the Senate Armed Services Committee.

Friday News Dump: Partial Hagel Donor List Includes Saudis, Turkey.  The Atlantic Council, chaired by former Sen. Chuck Hagel (R-NE), released a list late Friday evening [2/8/2013] of corporate donors as well as foreign governments that had funded it over the past five years.  The list did not shed light on individuals such as Saad Hariri, whose family has given generously to the Atlantic Council and who has supported the Hamas terror organization publicly, as well as offering financial support to Syrian rebels.

The adventures of 'Richard Windsor' — EPA e-mail dump due today.  Sometime Friday [2/15/2013], the Environmental Protection Agency is expected to deliver a tranche of "Richard Windsor" emails to the Competitive Enterprise Institute.  Those emails may shed light on the efforts of Lisa Jackson, EPA's departing administrator, to conceal details of her involvement in President Obama's war on coal by using the fictional Windsor as a false online identity for certain federal record-keeping.

Obama Should Admit That Dan Quayle Had It Right.  Late last year, the Department of Health and Human Services released results of a rigorous study showing that the Head Start program, costing $8 billion a year, has had little or no effect on the cognitive, physical or emotional well-being of kids once they reach third grade.  This was clearly what President Obama didn't want people to hear, and we can't help but wonder why the study, completed in October, was not made public until the Friday before Christmas.  Undaunted by the data, Obama now wants to replicate the ineffectiveness of Head Start on a much bigger scale.

More than 700 pages of healthcare rules released.  The Obama administration on Friday released more than 700 pages of new regulations to implement portions of the Affordable Care Act.  The four rules, which are scheduled for publication in mid-March, finalize both major and minor parts of the healthcare reform law that Congress passed in 2010.  Three of the regulations are final and roll out the multistate healthcare exchanges and reforms to the insurance market, including provisions to encourage cost-sharing, stabilize health insurance premiums and prevent providers from denying coverage.

Guess what! It's time for 700 pages more of fun Obamacare regulations.  Nancy Pelosi was wrong:  Even after passing the bill, no one could have possibly known what was in it!  That's because America's finest bureaucrats are creating a galaxy of amazing new rules to implement provisions of the "Affordable Care Act".  In the traditional Friday-night document dump that is the hallmark of how the Obama Administration operates, The Hill writer Megan Wilson reports that over 700 pages of new rules were released [...]

46,609,072 People on Food Stamps in 2012; Record 47,791,996 in December.  On Friday [3/8/2013], the United States Department of Agriculture quietly released new statistics related to the food stamps program, officially known as SNAP (the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program).  The numbers reveal, in 2012, the food stamps program was the biggest it's ever been, with an average of 46,609,072 people on the program every month of last year.  47,791,996 people were on the program in the month of December 2012.

ICE freed 122 Arizona criminals.  More than a third of the 342 illegal immigrants released from detention facilities in Arizona last month were convicted criminals, and one of them was categorized as a Level 1 offender, the highest risk, according to data released by the federal government Friday [3/15/2013].

Why Is Harry Reid Ashamed Of Senate Democrats' Budget Plan?  It was no mistake that the big reveal by Senate Democrats that they had no plan whatsoever to ever bring the budget into balance came on Friday evening [3/22/2013] going into pre-dawn Saturday morning.  Harry Reid and crew clearly were embarrassed by their budget and hoped to avoid widespread media coverage by scheduling votes when they would receive the least amount of attention.

Auto makers: EPA gas rules good for environment, bad for wallets.  The Environmental Protection Agency's stringent new gasoline rules will be good for the environment but will cost both car manufacturers and consumers more money, automakers say.  The Tier 3 standards, released Friday [3/29/2013], will require carmakers to reduce emissions and reduce the sulfur content of gasoline by 2017, cutting sulfur by more than 60 percent and other pollutants by 80 percent.

Eric Holder was aware that Fox News reporter was to be snooped on.  U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder approved the decision to seize phone records and personal emails of FOX News reporter James Rosen, the Justice Department disclosed late Friday [5/24/2013].  The journalist's messages were obtained after investigators checked with 'the highest levels of the department, including discussions with the Attorney General,' the department said in a statement.

Update:
Ex-State Dept. adviser to plead guilty in leak to Fox News.  A former State Department arms expert pleaded guilty Friday [2/7/2014] in federal court to disclosing national defense information to a Fox News reporter.  Stephen Jin-Woo Kim admitted sharing information from a top-secret intelligence report on North Korea with Fox chief Washington correspondent James Rosen.  Investigators in the case also targeted Rosen, calling him a possible "co-conspirator" in order to obtain a search warrant for his personal e-mail.

Obamacare will share personal health info with federal, state agencies.  A new 253-page Obamacare rule issued late Friday [6/14/2013] requires state, federal and local agencies as well as health insurers to swap the protected personal health information of anybody seeking to join the new health care program that will be enforced by the Internal Revenue Service.

State Department's Sex Trafficking Scandals.  Pssst, did you hear?  President Obama is replacing Ambassador Howard Gutman in Belgium.  You remember Ambassador Gutman, don't you?  He's the big Democrat donor President Obama nominated to represent his policies in Belgium and who, it is alleged, trolled for prostitutes — some of them children! — in a park near his official residence.  Late in the day on Friday, June 21, the White House released a list of new nominees for various posts, and Denise Bauer was listed for the United States Ambassador to Belgium post.

The Obamacare mess.  The administration can call it whatever it wants, but there is no hiding the embarrassment of a climbdown on a high-profile feature of President Barack Obama's signature initiative — although the administration seemed determined to do all it could to hide it.  If Bloomberg hadn't broken the news on Tuesday, the administration was apparently planning to announce it on July 3 — only because the day before Thanksgiving and Christmas Eve were too far off.

Obamacare's Invitation to Fraud.  [Scroll down]  Other states clearly shared this worry about how they were supposed to confirm eligibility for subsidies.  But on Friday, the Obama administration answered their question with what is becoming the familiar refrain of Obamacare implementation:  "never mind."  Buried in a massive 600-page rule released without fanfare the day after July 4, the administration announced that it would effectively delay the requirement to verify eligibility in the state exchanges.

The White House says you can sign up 'without further verification.'
ObamaCare's 'Liar' Subsidies.  The White House seems to regard laws as mere suggestions, including the laws it helped to write.  On the heels of last week's one-year suspension of the Affordable Care Act's employer mandate to offer insurance to workers, the Administration is now waiving a new batch of its own ObamaCare prescriptions.  These disclosures arrived inside a 606-page catch-all final rule that the Health and Human Services Department published on July 5 — a classic Friday news dump, with extra credit for the holiday weekend.

Obama Administration Illegally Amends Obamacare.  The Obama Administration has taken an axe to the Affordable Care Act, after finally admitting that it is too complex to implement.  The move to delay the employer mandate appears to be illegal on its face.  It is also further redundant proof that Obamacare must be repealed.  As announced in a post on the Treasury blog, the administration, through the IRS, is delaying the implementation of "reporting requirements", leading to a one-year suspension of the mandate that employers provide health insurance to their full-time employees.  The announcement was leaked to two reporters from Bloomberg News, and was originally scheduled to be made the eve of the July 4th federal holiday.

Documents shed light on U.S. surveillance programs.  The Obama administration released two documents on Friday describing the scope of National Security Agency data collection programs, a bid to quiet criticism they violate privacy rights.  An NSA memorandum describes the beginnings of the agency's collection of so-called telephone metadata of nearly every American under a provision of the Patriot Act, and the agency's monitoring of foreign Internet traffic.

Going Around Congress, Again.  [Scroll down]  Just before Christmas, Health and Human Services (HHS) were preparing to release their long-overdue evaluation of the Head Start Program.  Since it's [sic] inception in 1965, taxpayers have spent more than $180 billion on the program.  The HHS scientifically-rigorous study tracked 5,000 children who were randomly assigned to a group receiving Head Start services or a group that did not participate.  It followed their progression from age three or four through the end of third grade.  The first-grade study found that any benefits the children may have accrued while in the Head Start program were gone by the time they reached first grade. [...] In spite of prodding from Congress, they did not make the study public until the Friday before Christmas.

U.S. debt jumps a record $328 billion — tops $17 trillion for first time.  U.S. debt jumped a record $328 billion on Thursday [10/17/2013], the first day the federal government was able to borrow money under the deal President Obama and Congress sealed this week.  The debt now equals $17.075 trillion, according to figures the Treasury Department posted online on Friday [10/18/2013].

US quietly releasing $1.6B in Pakistan assistance.  The U.S. has quietly decided to release more than $1.6 billion in military and economic aid to Pakistan that was suspended when relations between the two countries disintegrated over the covert raid that killed Osama bin Laden and deadly U.S. airstrikes against Pakistani soldiers.

HHS to issue sweeping mental health rules.  The Obama administration will issue long awaited regulations Friday [11/8/2013] that require insurers to treat mental illness and addiction the same as physical illnesses, current and former lawmakers said.  In testimony Thursday before a Senate Judiciary subcommittee, mental health advocate and former Rep. Patrick Kennedy (D-R.I.) said Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius would announce the action during a speech in Atlanta.  Members of the panel familiar with the rule-making also said the regulations would be issued Friday.

AG Holder asks for appeal in Fast and Furious case holding him in contempt.  Attorney General Eric Holder wants to appeal a recent judge's ruling that allows the House to continue with its contempt case, related to Holder's refusal to turn over documents concerning the Justice Department's failed Operation Fast and Furious gun-tracking program.  Holder made the request Friday night [11/15/2013] to U.S. District Court Judge Amy Berman Jackson, asking that the Justice Department be allowed to put the case in front of a federal appeals court before Jackson makes any final decisions.

EPA proposes reducing biofuel mandate.  The Obama administration on Friday [11/15/2013] proposed to reduce the amount of ethanol in the nation's fuel supply for the first time, acknowledging that the biofuel law championed by both parties in 2007 is not working as well as expected.

11 tough questions Obama is happy he didn't get.  First the good news from President Obama's final news conference of 2013:  "I've run my last political race."  Of course, Obama made no new news.  If he'd wanted to make news, he would not have scheduled it on short notice and on a Friday, when politicians release news they want overlooked.

HHS Regulation Could Add More Names to List of Prohibited Gun Buyers.  The Obama administration says it is doing away with "unnecessary legal barriers" that discourage states from sending the names of some mentally ill people to the national background check system for gun-buyers.  Late on Friday afternoon [1/3/2014], the Department of Health and Human Services announced that it plans to modify HIPAA — the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996 — "to expressly permit certain HIPAA-covered entities (hospitals, doctors, clinics, etc.) to disclose to the National Instant Criminal Background Check System (NICS) the identities of individuals" with mental problems that should legally disqualify them from owning a gun.

It's Official: 65% of Small Firms Face ObamaCare Premium Hikes.  Released into a news black hole last Friday, an official Obama administration report finds that ObamaCare will push premiums up for two-thirds of small businesses.  Cross off another ObamaCare promise.

Obama's ever-growing insurance-company bailout.  Health-insurance executives are starting to warn of double- and even triple-digit premium hikes for health plans sold on the ObamaCare exchanges for 2015.  But Health Secretary Kathleen Sebelius told Congress last week that any ObamaCare premium hikes would be modest.  In fact, the Obama administration is scrambling to rewrite the law to make that happen.  After close of business Friday, the administration proposed greater bailout protection for insurers who sell exchange plans.  The new rule sweetens what the Affordable Care Act provided (at taxpayer expense, of course) to protect the companies from losses.  It's illegal, because no president has the constitutional authority to rewrite any law, including the Affordable Care Act.

Obama EPA To Regulate Bovine Emissions.  It's our lust for cheeseburgers that's dooming the planet through climate change, the Obama administration said in a Climate Action Plan released Friday [3/28/2014] that seeks to save us all from ruminant livestock.  Having already blamed the Industrial Revolution for what we used to call weather and temperatures that have flat-lined for 15 years, the White House is now targeting American agriculture abundance by slashing methane emissions from cows by 25% by 2020.

EPA Paid Nearly $500K in Unauthorized Bonuses.  The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) paid out nearly $500,000 in unauthorized bonuses, according to a report released by the EPA Inspector General Friday [5/2/2014].  An Inspector General (IG) investigation found that 11 EPA employees received $481,819 in unauthorized retention bonuses between 2006 and 2013.  The bonuses are meant to incentivize employees who receive other job offers.  The bonuses are supposed to be reauthorized annually, but for 10 of those EPA officials, the IG could find no evidence that their bonuses were reviewed, as required by federal regulations and EPA policies.

HHS widens O-Care penalty exemptions.  People who obtained health plans off the marketplaces after March 31 will not automatically face a penalty under the individual mandate, the Obama administration said Friday [5/2/2014].  In a bulletin, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) created a temporary hardship exemption for people who purchased coverage that was effective on Thursday of this week or beforehand.  The move essentially nullifies the month of April for the purposes of enforcing the mandate.  Previously, people with a three-month gap in coverage in 2014 would have faced a penalty of $95 or 1 percent of annual household income.  This meant that almost everyone needed to have health insurance by March 31.  But the administration changed this deadline to May 1 for many people who struggled to enroll on the marketplaces.

General Motors Is Recalling 51,000 Cars to Fix Fuel Gauge.  General Motors is recalling 51,640 Buick Enclave, Chevrolet Traverse and GMC Acadia sport utility vehicles of the 2014 model year because faulty software may cause the fuel gauge to read inaccurately, federal regulators said Saturday [5/3/2014].

On a Friday afternoon:
White House Press Secretary Resigns.  Jay Carney, the White House press secretary, is leaving his post as the public face of the administration, stepping down after shifting from two decades of reporting to politics at the highest levels, President Obama said on Friday.  Mr. Obama, who announced Mr. Carney's departure, said Mr. Carney would be replaced by the deputy press secretary, Josh Earnest.

Phoenix VA gave 10 mil in in bonuses in last 3 years.  Newly released records show the Phoenix VA Health Care System paid out roughly $10 million in bonuses during the past three years, when some staff manipulated patient wait-time records to trigger bonuses as veterans died awaiting care.  The Arizona Republic, after asking for bonus records at least 10 times since March, obtained the data Friday [6/13/2014] from the Department of Veteran Affairs under the federal Freedom of Information Act.  Bonus payouts increased significantly under Sharon Helman, who became director of the Phoenix VA in February 2012.

Sometimes Friday document dumps happen on Thursday, if Friday is a federal holiday.
HHS releases 1,296 pages of regulations ahead of holiday weekend.  As Americans scrambled ahead of the July Fourth holiday weekend on Thursday afternoon [7/3/2014], the Department of Health and Human Services released 1,296 pages of new regulations dealing with payment rates to doctors and hospitals.  The timing of the news release is part of a long pattern for President Obama's administration, which has often used holidays as an opportunity to dump dense regulatory changes when most reporters and Americans are focused on their holiday plans.  The release came at 4:15 p.m.

New ObamaCare Rules Mean Less Care, More Paperwork.  On July 3, when Americans were preparing to celebrate freedom, the Obama administration reduced freedom by adding 1,296 pages of regulations to ObamaCare.  The burdensome rules were published in the Federal Register on Independence Day eve, when few were likely to be watching.  So much for transparency.

White House Hid Huge Spike Of Families Crossing Border.  New data shows the White House has painted a false picture of the Central American migration by hiding a huge spike in "family units" who are illegally crossing the Texas border.  The data, which was dumped by the U.S. border patrol late Friday afternoon [7/18/2014], shows that inflow of youths and children traveling without parents has doubled since 2013, to 57,525 in the nine months up to July 2014.

Friday News Dump: Feds Unveil New Birth Control Mandate.  The problem with ObamaCare isn't just that it's the so called law of the land, said law seems to keep changing in reaction to events and court rulings until not even "we have to pass it to see what's in it" holds up to the slightest scrutiny.

IRS says it has lost emails from 5 more employees.  The Internal Revenue Service has lost emails from five more employees who are part of congressional probes into the treatment of conservative groups that applied for tax-exempt status, the tax service disclosed Friday.

Obama Quietly Begins Unilateral Immigration Reform.  President Obama Friday made a downpayment on the sweeping immigration "reform" he is expected to unilaterally declare once the elections are out of the way, permitting up to around 100,000 prospective Haitian immigrants to bypass immigration law and enter the country.  The move, a typical Friday announcement designed to attract minimum notice, eliminated wait times for future Florida Democratic voters Haitians who have been approved to gain green cards in two years, allowing them to make their way to the United States beginning in 2015 instead and begin working if they want.  Their entry has to have been petitioned by "family" members already in the United States.

Professsional Political Class: "Stay The Course" = Strategic Massive News Dumps.  They're trying to flood the field ahead of Thanksgiving, it's brutally obvious.  This is classic use of "the bathtub principle" at work:  Today IRS reports recovery of 30,000 Lois Lerner emails from '09 to '11[.]  Today House Intel "Panel" Releases Benghazi Report[.]  Today Obama gives speech on highly anticipated immigration Executive Order[.]  Today media and nation await Saint Louis Mike Brown shooting verdict.  100 FBI agents dispatched to Ferguson[.]  DOJ Releases 40,000+ Fast and Furious documents (emails)[.]  HHS Admits ObamaCare enrollment overstated.

It's Probably Just A Coincidence That 30,000 Lois Lerner Emails Were Discovered Right After The Election.  By now, the whole world knows that on Friday [11/21/2014], 30,000 "missing" Lois Lerner emails were discovered.  We don't want you to think that there's anything shady going on here.  It's probably just a coincidence that they were found a couple of weeks after an important, mid-term election.  These 30,000 emails were allegedly lost forever.  But, lo and behold, they were discovered on backup disaster recovery tapes!  Yes, the same kind of backup disaster recovery tapes that experts have been telling us existed all along.

The Editor says...
Notice also that this announcement came the day after Obama's imperial declaration of amnesty for illegal aliens, which is likely to displace this topic on all the weekend political talk shows.

HHS calls for slew of Obamacare rule changes.  The Obama administration late Friday [11/21/2014] called for numerous significant changes to rules controlling the Obamacare health care program, including ones that would shorten open-enrollment seasons, increase transparency of insurance plans and prices, and push current customers toward lower-cost plans.  Most of the new rules proposed by the Health and Human Services Department would go into effect in 2016 if they are approved.  The extensive proposed changes were outlined by a six-page fact sheet distributed by HHS, containing 35 different individual explanations of the suggestions.  The proposals themselves are 324 pages long.

White House Quietly Releases Plans For 3,415 Regulations Ahead Of Thanksgiving Holiday.  While Americans are focused on what delicious foods they're going to eat for Thanksgiving, the White House is focused on releasing its massive regulatory agenda — marking the fifth time the Obama administration has released its regulatory road map on the eve of a major holiday.  The federal Unified Agenda is the Obama administration's regulatory road map, and it lays out thousands of regulations being finalized in the coming months.  Under President Barack Obama, there has been a tradition of releasing the agenda late on Friday — and right before a major holiday.

Massively destructive environmental regulations announced on the day before Thanksgiving:
EPA unveils contentious plan to tighten ozone standards.  The Obama administration unveiled an ambitious plan Wednesday [11/26/2014 - the day before Thanksgiving] that it said would improve public health by slashing the ozone pollution that causes smog.  Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Administrator Gina McCarthy framed the update to the ground-level ozone standard as an imperative, bringing agency rules in line with the latest science to protect the nation's most vulnerable populations from a range of respiratory illnesses including asthma.

DoD renames "unlawful combatants" in detainee manual to ....  In fact, captured terrorists went out of style a long time ago, so that's not the actual change.  Until recently — like, say, two weeks ago — the Department of Defense used the term unlawful combatant as the label for terrorists captured by American military and intelligence forces as a way to distinguish them from uniformed soldiers of a recognized state authority in a straight-up fight.  Their new manual dispenses with that term, the Federation of American Scientists noticed today [11/26/2014].

The president rewrites the ObamaCare law — again.  On Thanksgiving eve, the Obama administration dumped reams of mind-numbing ObamaCare regulations into the Federal Register — including yet more unilateral rewrites of the Affordable Care Act.  Dropping the rules as most Americans were busy preparing for the holiday made a mockery (again) of President Obama's promise to have "the most transparent administration in history."  The stunt has even worked to keep most of the media from reporting on the rules.  Yet the changes these regulations make in the health care law are substantial.

Christmas Eve Document Dump Reveals NSA Wrongdoings.  While many Americans were sitting down for Christmas Eve meals and celebrations, the National Security Agency released redacted documents in which the agency admits to having "incorrectly acquired" surveillance data and violating the law over the past 12 years.  The documents, which detail many instances of wrongdoing from 2001 to 2013, were released following a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit brought forth by the American Civil Liberties Union.

Feds to Weigh Children in Daycare.  Bureaucrats from the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) will weigh and measure children in daycare as part of a study mandated by First Lady Michelle Obama's Healthy Hunger-Free Kids Act.  The agency published a notice in the Federal Register on Friday [3/20/2015] proposing data collection on what meals are served in professional and home daycare facilities and how much physical activity children perform.  Aside from assessing how healthy the food in daycare is, the USDA will also check the weight and height of roughly 3,000 children.

DHS blames tech glitch for violating judge's amnesty injunction.  The Obama administration blamed a technology glitch for why it continued to approve new amnesty applications in February, even after a federal judge issued an injunction, telling the court late Friday [5/15/2015] that they are now begging about 2,000 illegal immigrants to tear up their three-year work authorizations.  U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, the Homeland Security agency that approved the deportation amnesty applications for Dreamers despite the judge's order, insisted it's corrected the immigrants' records at headquarters, but said it's also asking the immigrants themselves to send back their three-year documents and accept two-year papers instead.

Obamas worth millions, disclosure forms reveal.  President Obama and first lady Michelle Obama's assets total somewhere between $1.9 million and $6.9 million, according to financial disclosure forms released Friday [5/15/2015] by the White House.  The bulk of the Obamas' wealth is invested in U.S. Treasury bills and notes, the total being estimated between $1.25 million and $5.25 million.

GOP slams Obama's latest 'land grab'.  Top Republicans on Friday [7/20/2015] accused President Obama of a "surreptitious land grab" after the administration claimed more than 1 million acres in California, Texas, and Nevada, designating the land as new national monuments.  Mr. Obama formally designated the land Friday afternoon [7/10/2015].

EPA [was] aware of 'blowout' risk at mine that could release tainted wastewater.  Managers at the Environmental Protection Agency were aware of the possible risk for a catastrophic "blowout" at an abandoned mine that could release "large volumes" of wastewater laced with toxic metals, according to internal documents released late Friday [8/21/2015].  EPA released the documents following weeks of prodding from news organizations like The Associated Press.

The details behind that EPA gold mine spill just get worse and worse.  The "unfortunate accident" that the EPA had near Silverton, Colorado recently has raised all sorts of questions, not the least of which is why it took the agency 24 hours to tell anyone about it.  (The folks who draw water off the river are particularly interested in that one.) But hey... accidents happen, right?  I mean, it's not like anyone could have seen it coming.  Except that the EPA actually did see it coming.  During a late Friday night document dump the Environmental Protection Agency lifted the mask just a bit and revealed that they knew what they were getting into.

Interior Department quietly suspends Arctic drilling leases.  As part of the Friday night [10/16/2015] news dump, the Obama administration did a complete about face on the subject of Arctic oil exploration.  After years of supporting research and efforts to keep our options open for future energy development, Interior Department boss Sally Jewell sent out word that extensions or expansion of permits for drilling off of Alaska's coast would essentially be extinguished.

IRS' Lois Lerner Skates; An Ugly Precedent Is Set.  Is there anyone out there subject to an Internal Revenue Service audit or a multiyear delay in approval for tax-exempt status who won't be concerned that the process is politically rigged against them?  That's the message the Justice Department sent when, in a classic Friday night news dump, it decided to not file charges against IRS tax-exempt groups chief Lois Lerner.  In a letter to the House Judiciary Committee, Justice said that while it found "mismanagement, poor judgment and inertia," there was no case for a criminal prosecution.

Lois Lerner and the Rule of Lawlessness.  In a Friday news dump, Obama's Justice Department announced that following its "investigation," Lois Lerner will not be charged for any wrongdoing in the case of the IRS' targeting of conservative organizations.  The law, apparently, is only meant for little people. [...] Tellingly, the Committee concluded that:  "The IRS's treatment of these organizations was almost universally consistent with Lerner's personal political views — this is, supporting Democratic candidates and opposing conservative tax-exempt organizations that engaged in political speech.  Conservative organizations that sought to participate in the nation's political discourse, such as the Tea Party, drew the strongest ire from Lerner."

Obamacare Repeal Would Cut Deficit, Boost Growth — CBO.  A little-noticed report released Friday afternoon [12/11/2015] by the Congressional Budget Office shows that the Senate bill to repeal most of ObamaCare would cut the deficit by as much as $474 billion, while boosting GDP, investment and capital stock.  The findings stand in sharp contrast to promises by President Obama and other Democrats that ObamaCare would accelerate economic growth and lower federal deficits.  According to the CBO, repealing ObamaCare's subsidies and Medicaid expansion would cut federal spending by almost $1.4 trillion over the next 10 years.  And getting rid of its myriad tax hikes would reduce tax revenues by $1.1 trillion, resulting in $281 billion decrease in projected deficits over the next decade.

2015 set new record for terror plots in U.S..  Last year saw the most terrorist attacks and plots in the U.S. since Sept. 11, 2001, according to the Heritage Foundation's tally, which was released Friday [1/8/2016] just as the Obama administration announced a series of new terror-related arrests and indictments.  The 13 "Islamist-inspired" attacks and plots uncovered in 2015 were more than the previous three years combined, according to Heritage researched Riley Walters.

White House under fire for 'censoring' video of French president's speech by eliminating interpreter's translation of the words 'Islamist terrorism'.  The Obama administration is under fire for briefly censoring a portion of video footage in which French president Francois Hollande uttered the phrase 'Islamist terrorism' — a pairing of words that the president has consistently cut out of its homeland security lexicon.  Calling the omission the result of 'a technical issue with the audio,' a red-faced White House re-posted an unedited version of the footage late on Friday [4/1/2016].

Obama Commutes Sentences of More Violent Criminals.  The fundamental transformation continues to roll on as scheduled.  As always, Obama waited until late Friday afternoon, when reporters largely pack up for the weekend, to announce the commutation of sentences for 42 more drug traffickers in federal prison.  President Obama defended this move as a common sense gesture to low-level nonviolent drug offenders, but as we've explained over the past few years, most people in federal prison are anything but "nonviolent."  MRC has posted the names of 10 of the individuals who were convicted of firearms violations in addition to drug trafficking charges.  This at a time when Obama wants to crack down on law-abiding gun owners and dealers.